Riviera Partners Appoints Chief People Officer
January 5, 2023 – San Francisco-based Riviera Partners, a recruitment provider specializing in C-level engineering, product, and design leader placements, has named Decio Mendes as its chief people officer. “Mendes’ enthusiasm for people, expertise in organizational development, and ability to instill a positive culture is a key part of Riviera’s growth,” said Will Hunsinger, CEO at Riviera Partners. “As we continue to scale, we must nurture a vibrant team environment that will inspire our team to bring out the best in themselves.”
Mr. Mendes joins the organization from FLYN, a corporate development firm that he co-founded, which supports clients in developing breakthrough, innovative HR strategies, leadership development and talent management programs, and employee engagement approaches.
Mr. Mendes has a passion for making organizations run smoothly and employees feel valued. For the past 20 years, he has worked with senior management teams across a broad range of industries to achieve breakthrough business, organization, and individual performance. He is skilled in leading large business improvement and change management programs, having designed and executed some of the largest transformation programs conducted by three global management consulting firms.
In his new role with Riviera Partners, Mr. Mendes will lead and inspire Riviera’s people and culture strategy via organizational development, talent management and training, and employee experience for the company’s worldwide team. “My passion is people and unearthing the best in each and all,” said Mr. Mendes. “As we embark on a new year, there’s no better time to focus on building a resilient, diverse, and healthy foundation that will cultivate an effective, tight-knit culture across Riviera’s globally distributed workforce.”
Riviera Partners is a global recruiting firm specializing in the technology industry. The firm provides clients with optimal placements by combining recruiter interactions and experience with data-driven findings about candidates. Riviera Partners has recruited for key executive roles at Pinterest, Postmates, Tinder, Twilio, Uber, Asana, Dropbox, GitHub, DoorDash, Hulu, and partnered with venture-backed concerns, including Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia, Benchmark, Accel, Menlo Ventures, KPCB, Greylock, and General Catalyst.
Related: Riviera Partners Names Chief Technology Officer
Through machine learning algorithms, Riviera Partners identifies specialized, highly qualified candidates that fit an organization’s needs from 600,000 professionals across tech geographies. Riviera can often provide a short list of candidates in 30 days and has a success rate of over 95 percent.
Recent Growth
This latest addition follows Riviera Partners’ recent growth in London with the addition of Pete Alexander as a partner. Mr. Alexander joined Riviera Partners after 11 years with The Up Group, a digitally focused search, advisory, and networking firm where he led the product and tech practice. Prior to The Up Group, he spent five years at Skill Capital, an executive search firm focused on the European private equity space. “As our momentum continues to grow in Europe, Pete is a great and valued addition to our team, bringing a wealth of experience and a shared philosophy around the value of community building and relationships,” said Mr. Hunsinger.
Riviera Partners Receives Investment from Insight Partners
Riviera Partners has received an investment from global software investor Insight Partners. Privately backed since 2019, this investment allows Rivera Partners to forge additional opportunities for its recruiters and employees to scale into new markets and geographies. Riviera Partners will continue to operate independently. “With thousands of open engineering, product, and design leadership roles across Insight Partners’ portfolio, we know how in-demand top talent is,” said Allyson White, managing director at Insight Partners. “Riviera Partners has established a best-in-class, tech-driven approach to finding the best product and engineering candidates. Hiring is a critical component to a company’s success regardless of their stage, and we recognize that Riviera plays a large role in the health of the software ecosystem. We look forward to working with Riviera Partners as they continue to grow and place top technical leadership that will build the future generational companies.”
Mr. Alexander was the second partner to join the London office in several months. Myriam Vacher joined in June. Ms. Vacher came to Riviera Partners from True Search and brings extensive experience conducting C-suite and other senior-level searches for VC and PE-backed high-growth technology companies across the EMEA region. Prior to going into search, Ms. Vacher was a strategy consulting and account leadership executive at Accenture. In her early professional career, she focused on M&A work and held a mix of strategy and finance roles in industry and at a Big Four firm.
“Myriam is a highly respected recruiting partner with a proven track record in helping tech businesses hire the right talent for critical points in their lifecycle, be it at early stage, emerging growth or established enterprises,” said Mr. Hunsinger. “She’s an outstanding addition to our London-based team.”
Privately Backed Since 2019
In 2019, Riviera Partners closed a minority investment of $25 million led by private equity firms Kayne Anderson Capital Advisors and ROCA Partners. The financing will be used to fund Riviera Partners’ continued geographic expansion, strategic acquisitions, enhancements to its Sutro platform and the addition of staff to meet the increased demand for its services.
“We target high growth companies that bring game changing software, processes and analytics to industries that are often behind the technology curve,” said Nishita Cummings, partner at Kayne Partners Fund. “In the same way that advanced analytics changed the game of baseball, we believe that Riviera’s proprietary technology and processes are changing the way executive recruiting is done. We are thrilled to become an integral part of helping them grow during this exciting time.”
Related: Riviera Partners Acquires Arete Partners, Creates Riviera Ventures
Contributed by Scott A. Scanlon, Editor-in-Chief; Dale M. Zupsansky, Managing Editor; and Stephen Sawicki, Managing Editor – Hunt Scanlon Media
